from the north with
her under the assumed name of Captain Butler of Gardiner's dragoons. She was
going to lodge an information on the subject, to have him sought for as an
emissary of the Pretender; but Spontoon, (an old soldier,) while he pretended to
approve, contrived to make her delay her intention. No time, however, was to be
lost: the accuracy of this good dame's description might probably lead to the
discovery that Waverley was the pretended Captain Butler; an identification
fraught with danger to Edward, perhaps to his uncle, and even to Colonel Talbot.
Which way to direct his course was now, therefore, the question.
    »To Scotland,« said Waverley.
    »To Scotland!« said the Colonel; »with what purpose? - not to engage again
with the rebels I hope?«
    »No - I considered my campaign ended, when, after all my efforts, I could
not rejoin them; and now, by all accounts, they are gone to make a winter
campaign in the Highlands, where such adherents as I am would rather be
burdensome than useful. Indeed, it seems likely that they only prolong the war
to place the Chevalier's person out of danger, and then to make some terms for
themselves. To burden them with my presence would merely add another party, whom
they would not give up, and could not defend. I understand they left almost all
their English adherents in garrison at Carlisle, for that very reason: - and on
a more general view, Colonel, to confess the truth, though it may lower me in
your opinion, I am heartily tired of the trade of war, and am, as Fletcher's
Humorous Lieutenant says, even as weary of this fighting« --
    »Fighting? pooh, what have you seen but a skirmish or two? - Ah! if you saw
war on the grand scale - sixty or a hundred thousand men in the field on each
side!«
    »I am not at all curious, Colonel. - Enough, says our homely proverb, is as
good as a feast. The plumed troops and the big war used to enchant me in poetry;
but the night marches, vigils, couched under the wintry sky, and such
accompaniments of the glorious trade, are not at all to my taste in practice: -
then for dry blows, I had my fill of fighting at Clifton, where I escaped by a
hair's-breadth half-a-dozen times; and you, I should think --« He stopped